


warm me up

by ohrouge



Category: Formula 1 RPF
Genre: Angst, Eating Disorders, Hopeful Ending, M/M, Sexual Content
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-02
Updated: 2019-12-02
Packaged: 2021-02-25 22:28:57
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,864
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21652207
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ohrouge/pseuds/ohrouge
Summary: on some level george was aware he was spiralling, but at the same time, he found he couldn’t quite bring himself to care
Relationships: Alexander Albon/George Russell
Comments: 4
Kudos: 46





	warm me up

**Author's Note:**

> trying something a little darker this time. i do enjoy a good bit of angst but i'm a little nervous about how this one turned out - there were many many rewrites.
> 
> so i hope u enjoy.
> 
> also i feel i should note that i began writing this before george's mysterious illness so this is no way a comment or speculation about that. it's all based on my own experiences.
> 
> title from breathe me by sia, particularly the lines:  
"Be my friend, hold me  
Wrap me up, enfold me  
I am small and needy  
Warm me up and breathe me"
> 
> trigger warnings for eating disorder thoughts and behaviours, depressive thoughts, bulimia and vomit.

As much as he hadn’t expected the season to go well. Somehow he was still surprised by just how badly it was going. And there was absolutely nothing he could do to make it better. No amount of training, of hours spent in the simulator, of notes he took in engineering meetings, would make that car any faster. By the time the summer break came around he felt completely powerless and out of control. Every time he got into the car he knew exactly how his race was going to end, like he was stuck in some shitty film playing on loop.

It wrecked his confidence and his motivation and left him feeling like he was grasping on for anything to haul himself back up. On some level he was aware he was spiralling, but at the same time, he found he couldn’t quite bring himself to care.

It was that same recklessness that he felt in his chest as he braced himself over the toilet bowl in the dimly lit bathroom of a club in Budapest. He knew it wasn’t smart but it sparked a little life into his otherwise numb heart. He could have blamed the alcohol for the food and acid he’d just choked out, but he’d only had two drinks. It had much more to do with the two wet fingers of his right hand.

Coughing weakly, he shakily got to his feet, his legs feeling like jelly as the post-purge adrenaline surged through him. Ignoring the black spots dancing in his field of vision he stumbled away from the toilet. He needed another drink.

“George!” when he exited the cubicle he saw Alex leaning against the wall, his white shirt sticking to his damp chest, splattered with alcohol stains. A spike of fear pierced George’s heart as he scrambled to work out how long Alex had been there and if he’d figured out what he’d been doing. But the big grin on his face gave nothing away.

“I told you I’d be back in a minute,” George said as he started to wash his hands.

“I didn’t want to wait.”

George felt Alex step closer and he looked up to try figure out what the hell he was doing. But no sooner had he glanced at his best friend’s brown eyes, there were a pair of hands tilting his face up and a hungry pair of lips pressed insistently to his own. George’s immediate instinct was to try jerk away but Alex held him firm.

It was a good kiss; warm and passionate and full of feeling, like Alex was trying to breathe some life back into George. It could have filled George’s empty heart.

“What are you doing?” George muttered as he finally extracted himself from Alex’s embrace.

The look on Alex’s face was the second surprise of those few short moments. He had expected a smile, teasing perhaps, maybe lust burning in his eyes. But all he saw was tender concern written across his best friend’s face, a kind of wistful sadness.

Alex didn’t answer him. He just leaned in and kissed George again. It was all tongue and teeth and it set George’s soul on fire. It filled him with electric energy, a different kind of joy than the one he felt when he finished a long, gruelling workout, or when his stomach began to cramp and growl with emptiness. George thought he could have sustained himself on Alex’s kisses alone.

Alex guided them backwards and George found himself pinned him against the cold tiled wall. Alex’s mouth attacked his neck as George tried to grab onto the walls to hold himself up right. He felt Alex’s hands snake under his shirt until they came to rest on his bare torso, perfectly positioned on the exact place where he knew his sharp ribs stuck out. George’s heart hammered in his chest but Alex’s mouth didn’t stop kissing, sucking and biting.

“Alex,” he murmured trying to move his hands, scared that Alex would find the truth in that touch. Alex did move his hands, but only lower so they wrapped around his waist, thumbs resting on his protruding hipbones, stroking over the brittle bone.

George squirmed, grabbing Alex’s hands again.

“Not here,” George shook his head.

“Alright,” Alex said, finally removing his lips from George’s skin.

Ignoring their dishevelled appearance George let Alex lead them through the club and into the back of a taxi. Taking Alex back to his room hadn’t exactly been what he’d meant, but he didn’t find himself wanting to correct Alex.

Alex kept a respectful distance as they walked through the hotel lobby and into the lift. He didn’t get too close as George opened the door. George only felt his hands again when Alex walked up behind him and wrapped his arms around him. The gesture was intimate but not in the same way he’d kissed him in the bathroom. Alex was so warm and George was suddenly aware of how cold his own skin was.

“I want to see you,” Alex murmured his mouth pressed into George’s shoulder.

“What?” George asked quietly, unsure what Alex meant. He had been under the impression that coming back here was going to be the start of a drunken but fun one-night stand. With his best friend no less, but that didn’t have to get in the way.

Again Alex seemed to ignore him. He lifted his hand so he could run it over George’s sharp collarbone before he trailed it down his arm until he took his wrist in his grasp, holding it lightly as his fingers curled all the way around it. Looking down, it reminded George of the compulsive habit that he had developed to remind himself that he was still okay, that whatever he’d eaten hadn’t ruined everything.

“Alex-“

George turned around with a hundred questions; why were they here? What did Alex want and what were they trying to do?

Alex had that same look on his face; that wistful sadness like he was asking George some desperate question. And in that moment, George knew Alex knew. It was painfully obvious. He didn’t know how he’d figured it out because George had done everything in his power to make it seem like everything was under control, like this was all natural.

In that moment George also knew that the reason Alex knew, and the reason why he was looking at him like he was in physical pain carrying around this secret, was because he was in love with him. It was written all over his face.

Then they were kissing again and falling onto the bed together and Alex was pulling off his clothes with an alarming speed and force. George was giving back as good as he was getting this time.

“We’re doing this,” Alex murmured, leaning over George, breathing heavily. There was a slight question to his words.

“Yeah we are,” George said, wrapping his legs around Alex. Maybe it was the wrong choice, to offer up this part of himself to Alex yet keep all his truths locked away. But this was what he wanted right now. He wanted to stop thinking, he wanted to forgot, and he wanted to lose himself in Alex.

He held on so tightly, their bodies moving in ecstatic synchronisation that he thought his chest was going to burst. Alex was on top of him, around him, inside him. He’d had sex before, but not like this. Never with someone who was giving him everything.

“I know what you’re doing,” Alex whispered, some time later, when they were both lying next to each other naked, only pretending to be sleeping. It was still dark out but the curtains hadn’t been closed and the neon lights of the city filtered in through the windows.

“I’m not doing anything,” George said reflexively. It was his go-to answer.

_How are you? I’m fine._

_Are you hungry? Oh I already ate._

_You don’t look very well, are you alright? Just a bad night’s sleep._

_Aren’t you going to eat more than that? I had a big lunch_.

It was so easy to lie. It had become his default and being honest had become much harder.

“Don’t lie to me George,” Alex said and he actually sounded exasperated, “You can lie to everyone else, but please, not to me. I’m not an idiot.”

George kept his mouth shut. If Alex wasn’t going to stomach his lies, then he’d just keep silent. It wasn’t that he was in denial, he knew exactly what he was doing, he just didn’t want to have this conversation.

“Have you actually looked at yourself lately? Have you seen how you’ve changed this past few months?”

Again, George kept quiet.

Alex leaned over to turn on the lamp, filling the room with unwelcome light. He sat up and looked at George, his eyes having turned from wistful to just sad.

“Look at you,” he said, helplessly gesturing with his hand. George glanced down at his bare torso for just a second. He didn’t need to look, he knew what it looked like; pale skin stretched tight over ribs and his chest and collarbones, the tight pockets of muscle straining to grow where he would scarcely let them. He had that image committed to his memory.

“George I’m scared,” Alex mumbled, “Do you…what does the team say? Do they even know? I mean, how could they _not _know…What about your trainer? He has to-…oh God George what-…”

George couldn’t stand the questions. It almost pained him how much Alex cared. He didn’t see what there was to care about. He certainly had stopped caring about himself, at least in all the ways that truly mattered. He only cared about pounds, kilograms, and stones now.

Why couldn’t Alex see he was a lost cause?

“The team know. Of course they bloody know,” George snapped, “They just don’t give a damn as long as I can sit in that car for two hours on a Sunday and drive. And Aleix he…”

George just sighed, remembering the shouting matches in the gym, in his kitchen, in his driver’s room, round the back of the garage. He had tried, George couldn’t fault him that. He was probably still trying, though he’d long learnt not to ask or lecture George anymore.

“George you’re beautiful,” Alex said quietly, bringing his hand up to lightly touch the side of his face.

_That’s a new one_. No one had ever tried that tactic on him before.

“That’s not why I do this.”

“Will you tell me why?” Alex asked, leaning in to press his forehead to George’s. And he felt it again; the infinite comfort held in a single touch.

“I can’t,” George said quietly. Maybe all of this would be easier if he knew why.

“Do you want to stop?” Alex asked again, his voice wavering slightly.

“I…”

“Don’t answer that,” Alex stopped George speaking with a kiss.

He didn’t feel any better. He was still spiralling, he’d still lost his grasp and there was no control to be found. But at least now he wasn’t alone.


End file.
